Remember Her
by WhiteWolf144
Summary: After Rory finds an old photo album, the Doctor dives back into the memories of the time he spent with one ceratin pink and yellow human. He tells the Ponds of Rose Tyler, his brilliant Rose, while the two listen on. The Doctor makes a new oath in the end, one he will never break.


**(A/N): Hello ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, non-genders, humans, Time Lords and people of other species! This is the first **_** Doctor Who **_**fic I ever wrote. Yay! I hope you like it. It's really nothing much, just a little idea I had after rewatching Ten's last few episodes and Eleven's first few. I'm Doctor/Rose trash, so that's where this came from. Anyway, I don't want to strech this out, so let's just get on with the story!**

_**Any and all reviews and criteria are highly appreciated! Thank you all in advance for taking time to read it, follow, favorite and/or review the story. **_

_**DISCLAIMER: **_I DO NOT own _Doctor Who _in any way.

The regeneration hurt, more than ever before. It wasn't his first time going through it all, but it certanly was his last. A Time Lord has tweve regenerations. He was on his eleventh, well, technically twelfth face. He usually named them after numbers of which said face was, but with the exception of the one that did the _thing._ If he counted him, it was his nineth, meaning this was the twelfth.

The regeneration burnt worse than ever. He didn't want to hange. He liked this face and the man wearing it. He was charismatic, and funny, and frankly, quite handsome. Sure, he was rude and very much not ginger, but still. It's been his favorite so far. So much that he regenerated and kept the same face. But he knew this time he couldn't do the same.

The process finished, and happily, he started counting his limbs, fingers, ears and eyes. His hair was longer, his nose not as bad as he had, so he couldn't complain. He did _not _want to talk about the chin. For a moment he thought he was a girl, but that passed as fast as it came. What truly had him upset was the fact that he _still was not ginger!_ In a flash, he remembered something important, that something being him crashing. Thank God he was alone when he screamed _GERONIMOOO! _

Climbing out of the TARDIS was not in any way pleasent, but he managed it. What he saw before him both amused and upset him. Before himself, he saw a human child, female, maybe 12 years old, a _ginger. _And here he was, on his twelfth regeneration, still very much not ginger. How did a human with one life manage it before him? Completely unfair-

Still, the Doctor quickly grew fond of the Scottish girl with a fairy-tale-like name, Ameila Pond. He wanted her to travel with him, but he got things a little messed up. He accidentally came back for her 12 years later instead of 5 minutes. To him it might not have been so long, but it was to Amelia. Still, she forgave him. And later, the Doctor thought it might have been better for him to travel with a grown-up rather than a child. The situations otherwise might not have been very pleasent, but rater messy.

What the Doctor never expected was a second passanger. Amelia way engaged to a man called Rory Williams, whom the Doctor liked and allowed to come on board. Things happened and he disappeared, only reappearing once when Ameila brought him back, which was actually on her and Rory's wedding day. He was glad his friends had each other, had someone to love. He lost that a long time ago. He lost that when he lost _her_. His fantastic, brilliant pink and yellow girl.

After some time of travelling with the Ponds, the Doctor started moving on, knowing she had the other him. She was happy, he thought so, at least. She had her mum and dad, her brother and him. By now, she might even have had a family of her own. The Doctor pushed away those thoughts.

The trio just came back from an adventure, with both Ponds exhausted. Thanks to his superior Time Lord physiology, he didn't need sleep like humans. He thought how much time they waste on sleeping, but he knew they had to. At such times, the Doctor often found himself bored. He had to find something to do. Sometimes, he'd do some repair work or just unneccesary jiggery-pokery around the TARDIS, sometimes he'd go visit his old friends (with them not aware of his presence, of course). Sometimes he'd play games in the arcade, do laps in the pool, watch movies or just lounge in the library, engrossed in books. He fancied that this particular evening.

He made his way to the huge library on board the TARDIS. His ship arranged them by genre, sorted alphabetically. Since the library was so big, he'd sometimes get things a little mixed up. This time, insted of finding books on quantum physics, he found old photo albums. His hearts ached. All were different sizes, but in the same leather binding and golden inscriptions. They were all of his adventures with his beloved companions, from the earliest on Gallifrey with other Time Lords (before he stole the TARDIS), to now with the Ponds.

His fingers hovered over the books with the names of post-Time War companions . _Amelia Pond, Donna Noble, Jack Harkness, Martha Jones, Mickey Smith, Rory Williams _and _Rose Tyler_. All those who travelled with him. All those who gave up so much to go with him. All those whose lives he ruined.

He turned Martha, Jack and Mickey into real soldiers, Rose was locked up in another universe, breaking through with a huge gun to fight the Daleks. Who knows what she's doing these days. Donna doesn't remember him or anything she did. She'll never know how important she was. He didn't dare think what might become of the Ponds one day. He pulled out those albums, carrying them over to the couch in front of the fireplace. He looked through them.

There weren't many photographs of him and Jack or Mickey, most were taken with Rose, and were in her album. He had almost double of that with Martha, even more with Donna. He decided to put the Ponds together, which the TARDIS did immediately. He flicked through the pages, looking back on those memories. He went through all of them, but one.

The biggest album stood on the table, the one he just couldn't open. He put all of them back in place, with the exception of that one. He just left it on the table, for when he had the strenght to open it.

Days flew by, and the album collected dust on the library table. The Doctor still couldn't open it. He just couldn't look into her eyes, at her smiling face. He knew that if he did, his hearts would immediately break. And he just didn't have the strenght to go through it all over.

Rory wandered about the corridors of the TARDIS. Amy and the Doctor were in the console room, talking. He just didn't feel like sitting there with them, so he went on his own mini-adventure around the huge ship. He thought that by now, he had seen all the rooms, but this time, he ended up in a corridor he's never seen before.

A number of doors lined both walls of the TARDIS. Each looked practically the same, with different decorations. Mostly they were a bunch of circles and lines Rory recognized as the Doctor's language. He knew the TARDIS wouldn't translate Gallifreyan, so he didn't pay them much thought. He didn't walk into any of them, just passed them. But one door caught his attention.

Under the golden writting in Gallifreyan was a golden shiluette of a wolf, howling. He wondered why these doors were different to the others. There were still a couple of doors in the corridor after those, but none had the wolf or anything, just the Gallifreyan things. He opened the ones across from them, and found a simple bedroom. He didn't want to intrude, so he closed the doors quickly, and opened a few more. All bedrooms. But he knew enough to realize that the ones with the wolf were special.

He reached to open them, and burned his hand on the doorknob. He tried again, but it was clear the doors weren't meant to be opened. Pushing them aside, he continued walking, this time towards the console room.

As he passed the llibrary, he thought he saw something on the table. He felt the TARDIS landing, but went in anyway. On the table sat a book in leather covers, with a name written in gold. _Rose Tyler._ He thought the name sounded vaguely familiar, but couldn't put a finger on it. He flipped it around, and on the back saw the same wolf. So if those doors were a bedroom, it might have belonged to this Rose, if she travelled with the Doctor. What he didn't understand was what was so special about her. He opened the book and realized it was a photo album. He flipped through them.

Each had a blonde woman smiling the brightest smile Rory had ever seen. Some photos had different people in them. There were a couple of a handsome guy in a long military-looking coat. There were a few of her and a man with big ears in leather. A couple with a young African-American guy. And many of her and a very, very handsome man in a brown pin-stripped suit and long over coat and amazing hair.

But, both the man with big ears and great hair looked vaguely familiar. Had he seen them somwhere before? And if the blonde, who Rory imagined was Rose, traveled with the Doctor, why weren't there photos of them? He kept looking over the photos, when the realization of why the name sounded familiar hit him. It was the girl who went missing for a year in 2005, or maybe 2006, he wasn't sure. But, she was found. What happened to her later?

Amy and the Doctor had a nice chat in the console room while Rory went for a walk. The Doctor landed them on a planet where the ground beneth the people who walked on it reflected their mood in different colors. The Doctor checked for where Rory was on the monitor and found him in the library, looking through something. Just as she looked up at the Doctor, she knew something was up. His entire body tensed. Like he's just seen a ghost. She elbowed him and they headed for the library.

The two of them found Rory sitting on the couch looking at some photos. She plopped down next to him, looking at the photos as well. She noticed her old friend Rose in each of them. She hadn't seen Rose in years, but she was sure she was the blonde in the photos. Some were just of her, some with a man with rediculus ears in black leather, some with a handsome man with a bright smile, some with a young black guy.

But most with a tall, thin man, with a manic, bright grin, warm brown eyes, in a tight brown suit and long coat, wearing Converse shoes. The man had hair like she's never seen, very modern style, shorter than the Doctor's, but pushed up with little hair gel. The longer she looked at him, the more handsome he became. And the man and Rose seemed very close.

Amy looked up at the Doctor, to find him still standing in the doorway, stiff as a corpse, shiny tears forming in his green eyes. His jaw was clenched tight, his expression sad.

"Doctor, who is this?" Rory asked. The Doctor imagined he must have connected the blonde with the name on the front of the album. Amy was looking at him like she noticed how heartbroken he was at that moment. He sat in between them, taking a couple of photos up. Most were Rose and his previous regeneration, some with Jack and Mickey, and the big ears regeneration. He smiled weakly at Rose's huge grin, bright eyes and hair pulled in a bun with a bandana. He remembered when he took that photo.

They accidentaly landed in 1953, the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. Rose wore that long pink dress and blue jacket. He remembered how they rode together on a scooter. He remembered how she told Eddie Conoly off for the flags. He remembered how he snapped at the heartbreak when he saw her standing in Detective-inspector Bishop's office. He remembered how angry he was, how much pain he was in. He remembered shouting at Magpie, her face calling for him in the TV. He remembered how much he wanted to kiss her when he finally saw her again.

"This, Ponds, is Rose Tyler", he said sadly, "She travelled with me for some time."

"But, if you two travelled together, why aren't you in any of these?" Amy asked. He sighed and began explaining regeneration.

"Us Time Lords have this little trick, which we use to avoid death", he said, "In case we are dying, severely injured or something, we can trigger this process we call regeneration. Basically we change. Completely. As this one said", he pointed to his previous face, "We change, but we have to die in order to do that. This body dies, and some new man goes sauntering away. Still the same Time Lord, but completely new. Every cell in our body changes, as does the way we behave, what we like, dislike, our fashion sense, everything. This one is my eleventh, well, techincally twelfth face. I usually mark them by numbers, it's easier to keep track, but there was one I just called War. So, I'm eleventh, this one was tenth, and the one with big ears was the ninth. We're the same person."

"Okay", Amy said, streching the word, "So, Time Lordy-stuff. So, you and Rose travelled together?"

"Yes, she was my companion for abou 2 years", he said. Amy looked sceptical, like she saw there was more.

"You don't look like she was just your companion", Rory questioned.

"That you are right about", the Doctor smiled. He trusted and loved the Ponds. He can tell them, "Rose wasn't just my companion. She was fantastic. Brilliant. She was just a shop-girl when we first met. But I always knew she was so much more. She was clever. And she became the defender of Earth."

"You loved her, didn't you?" Amy asked, like she finally understood who she was.

"Not loved, love", he corrected, a smile creeping across his face, "I love her more than anything. The nineth face fancied her, but Ten really fell head over heels for her. She was the first and last person he saw. Oh, how I loved her back then."

"Tell us about her", Rory urged, "What happened?"

"Well, we travelled together, seen many wonders", he sank back into the couch, letting the memories wash over him, "We ended up on this thing called Gamestation, fighting the Daleks. I knew how much danger we were in, so Jack and I sent her home. Jack's this handsome fella over here. This is Mickey. But, Rose found a way to get back. She opened up the TARDIS and took the Time Vortex into her head. She was burning up, but she destroyed all the Daleks, brought Jack back from the dead for good. He can't die. Nine took the Vortex out of her, but it killed him. He just had enough time to briefly explain what was happening, and he regenerated. Ten was born then. She was scared, she didn't understand what was happening. So, he took her home to think it through, but fell in post-regenerative coma. Of course, it was Christmas, so there was an invasion."

"Anyway, I dueled the Sycorax leader in a sword fight, lost my hand, grew a new one and won the match. All after tea woke me up from brain damage. Rose and I went back to the stars. We saw so many things. New Earth, fought a werewolf to save Queen Victory, got banished from the country, blew up a present day London school with Mickey and this woman Sarah Jane, who also used to travel with me. We visited a spaceship stalking Madame Pompadour, saved her, fell onto a parallel world, saved it from Cybermen, found out her father was still alive there. Mickey decided to stay back, and the two of us went back to this universe. We saved the Earth from a face eating alien in 1953, visited a planet orbiting a black hole, got stuck there with some lovely people. Turns out it was the prison of the Devil, quite literally, believe it or not. Anyway, we defeated him, went back to London, 2012 for the Olympics, found some missing kids and went back home to visit her mother."

"Turns out, an invasion just started. The Cybermen from the parallel world were breaking through here, from this thing called Torchwood. Anyway, the Daleks were also there. Miceky and Rose's dad from that world broke through to help. I wanted to send her with them when I found a way to get of the Cybermen and Daleks, but she came back. It almost cost her her life. She was almost lost to the Void, the space between worlds. He dad came and saved her, but she was stuck in that parallel world. I found a way to make a projection to say goodbye, because I couldn't break through to her, to get her back. My biggest regret in life was not telling her how much I loved her when she did. Anyway, I travelled with Martha and later Donna, a couple of years after Rose."

"There was a huge plot of the Daleks, if you remember the 26 planets in the sky. Rose broke back through because the universes were collapsing. Anyway, she, Martha, Donna, Jack, Mickey, Sarah Jane and I were all taken captive, afart from Donna. Something happened, and Donna got a Time Lord mind in her own, while from my cut off hand grew a human/Time Lord metacrisis of me. Anyway, once it was all done, I figured she deserved a better life. The metacrisis version of me stayed with her on the parallel world. He has one life, no regeneration. They'll be able to have a family, age and die together, something I could never give her. At least I know he told her how much we love her before I left. That was the last time I saw her. A couple of years later, I regenerated into this body and met you two."

He talked slowly and they listened carefully. His eyes were watering at the memories. He was glad someone in that life finally knew about their story.

"I'm sorry Doctor", Rory said. He just smiled at him.

"What was she like?" Amy asked, "I knew her a long time ago. But what was she like when she was travelling with you? What did she look like?"

"Oh she was brilliant. Simply fantastic. Her eyes shined like a million stars were trapped in them. Her smile could light up the darkest room. And her laugh could make the saddest man happy", he smiled, "She was a carer. She cared about everyone and everything. She was brave. Just simply fantastic."

"You're really in love, mate", Rory joked, to which the Doctor agreed.

That day, they didn't leave the TARDIS afterll. Isted, he told them more about their adventures, more about Rose and his other companions. They listened carefully, laughing at the jokes Donna made, admiring how brave Martha was, wishing they met Jack the Flirter. They sat there for hours, he kept talking about his brilliant Rose. He kept talking until the two of them fell asleep hours and hours later. He felt tired as well. The TARDIS teleported the two into their room, while the Doctor made way to his.

That night, he dreamed about Rose. About her smile. Her warm hand in his. Her eyes shining when she grinned. He relieved all the wonderful moments in the matter of hours. And finally, a vision came to him. The human version of him and herself, walking their kid, a happy, blonde 3-year old on the beach. They held hands, smiling at each other. When he woke up, he knew Rose was happy. He knew the metacrisis him took care of her. He knew they'll be alright.

And he knew it was time to move on. He knew he can't see her again, but he knew he had to move on, for his own sake. But he promised to himself never to let that love fade. To his oath, _never be cruel, never be cowardly_, he added a new part, _and never forget_. He will never forget the support of Martha Jones, the fabulous Donna Noble, the brave Mickey Smith, the honor of Cpatain Jack. And he will never, ever forget his brilliant pink and yellow girl. Rose Tyler left a mark on his heats, and not a thousand regenerations will erase that mark.

**(A/N): So, how was that? I hope you liked it. I personally did. It was something to prepare you all for the _Doctor Who_ story I'm writting, and a little break from _The Last Hero_ (_Percy Jackson_ fic). Anyway, the next chapter of that story will be out tomorrow, and the _DW_ story maybe in a month or two. I want to finish it before uploading. Anyway, till next time!**


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